Experts highlight the importance of energy efficiency in the transition to a sustainable future

PRESS RELEASE from Colbún
October 19, 2023

(Machine translation of the original release, issued in Spanish)

The fundamental role of energy efficiency in the transition towards a sustainable future is what was addressed in the discussion panel called “Energy Efficiency Law – The challenge of the reportability of large industries to achieve a real impact in the transition”, within the framework of the XXII ELECGAS 2023 Energy Meeting.

Luis Enrique López, General Manager of Colbún Soluciones by Efizity, participated in the dialogue that was moderated by Ignacio Santelices , Sustainability Manager at Fundación Chile, and also included Hernán Urrutia, Director at the Trade Association of Energy Efficiency Companies ( Anesco Chile ); Cristina Victoriano, Deputy Executive Director at the Energy Sustainability Agency; and Mauricio Riveros , Head of the Sustainable Energy Division at the Ministry of Energy.

During his speech, López highlighted the importance of energy efficiency to reduce emissions and optimize the use of resources in the industry, highlighting the implementation of measures such as energy efficiency, electrification and demand adaptation. “Energy efficiency is essential to consume as little as we can, and decouple the production curve from the energy consumption curve. Second, we can see how we electrify consumption where fuels dominate today, which allows us to save energy and reduce emissions. And today there are two elements that are helping a lot in this. First, heat pumps, which are in commercial development for medium temperatures, but technologies are being developed that will exceed 100 degrees. (…) Another example that is becoming widespread is the issue of transportation, mainly in passenger and last mile transportation fleets. The third point is that the demand adapts to the electrical conditions, we have a lot of variable renewable energy during the day and little renewable energy during the night. Nowadays customers have to be part of the solutions . Many times we can design processes to adapt to demand and benefit from price differences. In the medium term we hope that public policies will be developed that reward this ability to adapt the demand that clients make available to the system.”

For his part, Mauricio Riveros, Head of the Sustainable Energy Division at the Ministry of Energy, highlighted the importance of having adequate policies and regulations to promote energy efficiency at the national level. He noted that the legal framework is essential to encourage the adoption of efficient practices and promote investment in clean technologies. “To achieve carbon neutrality, there are four major pillars of action that we have to do. The first, obviously, is to remove fossil fuel plants in the long term. The second pillar is everything that is the decarbonization of demand; electrical demand, thermal demand, transportation demand. And this decarbonization necessarily requires electrification. Therefore, an increase in electricity consumption in the country. The third element is to move towards fuels that are increasingly lower in emissions, and eventually zero emissions. And finally, it is that we have the least possible loss of energy, which is why energy efficiency is the heart of all this transformation. Demand is also not a passive element, but demand can be an active element, which can be fundamental to achieving the energy transition at the lowest cost.”

Hernán Urrutia, Director of the Trade Association of Energy Efficiency Companies (Anesco Chile), emphasized the need for greater collaboration between the different actors in the energy sector and the need to promote energy efficiency in smaller and less conventional industries. “I believe that the ideal law is for it to permeate to the smallest, rarest industries, so that it really has an important or interesting impact, since it is a fundamental pillar, let's say, if energy efficiency is not going to reach the savings that we need, or the decarbonization that we need (…) I think we have a very important task, and we, through ESCO Models, have managed, at least, to make progress in some municipalities and with agency programs as well.”

Challenges

Although progress has been made on this issue, Cristina Victoriano, Deputy Executive Director at the Energy Sustainability Agency, points out that “we still have a lot to do, with consumption that we could optimize, with energy management not only with large consumers, but also energy management that we can do at all levels, throughout the industry, in all segments. In addition to generating more, generating cleaner, how do we stop using the energy that we are sometimes wasting.” Victoriano mentions that, regarding the implementation of the law, together with the Ministry of Energy they are working on a registry of auditors that will allow auditing the energy savings reported by companies. The auditors will be trained through a program that will be launched soon. They will also carry out the generation of a greater offer of energy management system implementation services, with the aim of expanding the market and having more specialized actors in the different areas of the industry.

According to the executive of Colbún Soluciones by Efizity, one of the main barriers for companies to implement the Energy Efficiency Law has been communication, but it was managed to be overcome well thanks to the time they had to approach the companies and transmit their content. However, he also mentions that one obstacle has been the need to divert resources to implement an energy management system. “Sometimes the economy is not the most important thing, sometimes it is the administration's time, it is the management's time, implementing an energy management system means a year of work before the savings arrive. So that is sometimes what discourages senior management from implementing these systems.” Despite this, the author highlights that “energy efficiency is business, by definition. The savings will always be greater than the investment and it is very easy to measure that this is actually profitable.”